CURRENT LITERATURE 



The Preservation of Structural Timber. By Howard F. Weiss. 

 iMcGraw-Hill Book Co., N. Y. 1915. Pp. XVIII+313. 



The wood-preservation industry in the United States has made 

 wonderful advance during the last decade and there are now in 

 operation ninety plants representing a capitalization of over $10,- 

 000,000, turning out annually over 125,000,000 cubic feet of 

 treated wood worth about $30,000,000. These plants use annually 

 over 100,000,000 gallons of creosote costing over $7,000,000, 

 over 21,000,000 pounds of zinc chloride costing about $1,000,000, 

 and 3,500,000 gallons of various other preservatives costing about 

 $1,250,000. "The amount of wood now annually treated repre- 

 sents a protection given to the annual output of approximately 

 20,000,000 acres of timberland." "It appears that the applica- 

 tion of efficient protective measures to structural timber would 

 decrease the drain on our forests by almost 7,000,000,000 board 

 feet annually, were all such timber liable to deterioration pro- 

 tected." 



The figures indicate the scope of the industry and its possi- 

 bilities and emphasize the need for fuller and more detailed in- 

 formation in regard to it. Not enough time has elapsed to judge 

 the efficiency of many of the processes which are in use or have 

 been advocated and accurate knowledge of the whole subject is 

 not always obtainable. Much has been written and claimed, but 

 statements are often contradictory or biased or based upon ineffi- 

 cient evidence, so that the searcher after truth has a most difficult 

 task. 



It is on this account that Mr. Weiss' book is so opportune. 

 It has sifted a great mass of material and given us in a clear, 

 coherent and competent manner a complete summary of the essen- 

 tials so far as they have been established or strongly indicated. 

 The way in which he has gone to first-hand sources for his infor- 

 mation and has approached every subject without bias adds 

 weight and authority to his statements. Mr. Weiss, as director 

 of the Forest Products Laboratory at Madison, is peculiarly fitted 



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